Julie and I are hiking the Appalachian Trail in the US from Springer Mt, Georgia, to Mt Katahdin, Maine, in the north, a distance of almost 2,200 miles (3,540 km). Our journey will start in early May 2023 and is expected to take about five months. We will be mostly camping, carrying 3-5 days of supplies to get us between resupply points, where we will be staying in hostels/hotels/motels where we can. I hiked the entire Appalachian Trail back in 1986 so it will be interesting to see how much has changed and how much it has stayed the same.

Appalachian Trail - Day 054 - Long Mountain Wayside to Priest Summit

Day: 054

Date: Saturday, 17 June 2023

Start:  Long Mountain Wayside (AT Mile 809.1) but staying in Lexington

Finish:  Priest Summit (AT Mile 830.1)

Daily Kilometres:  34.0 (Ascent 6050', Descent 4062')

GPX Track:  Click here for Julie’s Strava & Photos

Total Kilometres:  1397.4

Weather:  Mild and sunny 

Accommodation:  Tent

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  The Waffle House big breakfast 

  Lunch: New York sub

  Dinner:  Rehydrated meals 

Aches:  Dave - still dealing with right heel blister; Julie - nothing to report

Highlight:  It was a long climb to get there but Cole Mt Bald was a beautiful long ridge-top meadow with views all around on a stellar day. We met a number of day hikers on their way up to picnic there, some carrying kites.

Lowlight:  None really.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We got up early and walked across the road to the Waffle House soon after 6:00am for a very filling breakfast seemingly replete with all of the calories we would need for the day's hiking.


We checked out of our motel at 7:30am and were picked up by our shuttle driver, Derek, at 7:40am for the drive back up into the mountains and the trailhead where we had finished on Thursday.


By 8:10am we were hiking on a perfect day.  Of course, it was uphill and it took an hour and a half to reach the summit of Bald Knob (4045') with a couple of hazy views near the top.


We descended a little to a gap before climbing to Cole Mt followed by a beautiful journey across the Cole Mt Bald (see above).


There were a lot of hikers out and we took our first break at Salt Log Gap where there was a full car park.  From there, apart from a few short meadow sections, the rest of our day was spent in the "green tunnel" with occasional tree-filtered views.  Mostly, the trail was good, though some loose rocky sections slowed us down.


The last climb up to Priest Summit (4018') was long and rough underfoot in places.  We had hoped to get one of the prime tent sites we had heard about on the ledges looking north, but we were late, nearly 7:00pm by the time we got there, and they were already taken by other thru-hikers.  Nevertheless, we found a nice site a little further along the summit, although with no views, shortly after.  By this time a cold wind was blowing so maybe better not out in the open anyway.


We were relatively late to set up camp and get to bed, but happy with a nice day's hiking and 21 miles after a late start.

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